Z- zero, zig-zag, Zaccheus

We learned/played this week using the letter Z.  The kids had fun doing a water-resist art using white crayons to color the number 0, then using watercolors, painted over it with red paint.  

This was supposed to illustrate that Jesus washed our sins away white as snow--however, the color resist didn't work so well and some of the 0 got a little red.  I had to wipe it away with a tissue, and it worked ok since the part that wasn't colored stayed red.  The kids had fun, which was what matters most!







We made some Z letter formations using some felt cut into zig zag shapes...I was going to buy some ric-rac, but I have tons of material, so this seemed just as good to use!



The kids had SO much fun doing a "zig-zag race" where I set up cones in a zig zag pattern for them to follow.  Sean got the concept, Lilly-not so much!  She was more interested in trying to go fast and straight!  (I wish I would remember NOT to talk while taking videos of the kids!  My accent is absolutely twangy!)

Our Bible story for the week was of Zaccheus (who else?)  and the kids enjoyed using our felt board some more--Sean even told the story to us by himself, though it was just by singing the song I taught them that we all learned in Bible school..."Zaccheus was a wee little man, and a wee little man was he!" Sean emphasized the "You come DOWN!" part a little too enthusiastically...didn't get this on video so maybe I'll take one sometime and update this post...if I find the time...so don't count on it :)

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

Our Easter activities

It has been very difficult for me to get on the computer to blog the past couple of weeks!  The main reason is that Brilee has been having a terrible time teething, and spends most of Sean & Lilly's naptime crying--she is tired, but will not sleep nor play happily...so I spend most of the time playing with her or trying to comfort her.  Thankfully, her first tooth FINALLY popped through last Thursday (April 14) but she still has some others just below her gumline that are still bothering her.  She is giving me a little time today to get on here, so I'm going to try to finish this post!

We've been having some fun things going on for Easter!  I wanted to connect the Easter story with them AS MUCH as possible, so we've been reading it from their Bible almost every day.  I wanted to find or make a felt board set to use with them for Bible story time.  One day when we were at the park, I decided to drop by the Homeschool Room  before we headed home since it was nearby.  I asked if they had any Bible felt stuff, and they tell me they just got in a complete set of Betty Lukens' The Bible in Felt the day before!  I can't tell you how ecstatic I was!  They hadn't priced it out yet, so they took my name & number so they could call me when it was ready to see if I wanted to purchase it.  Well, yesterday they finally called me back, and I felt like a little kid again when I got home with it!  The pieces are all SO organized and it has backgrounds/overlays for all the different Bible stories along with the teacher's manual that contains the actual stories themselves.  I feel so blessed to have found this set, and the kids really connect with it as we're reading through the stories.  I think interaction is key at this age!



The set organized inside the box--there are 12 pages laid out like this one with a space for each piece with a corresponding number printed on each piece.

Jesus being arrested in the garden of Gethsemane

Jesus praying in the garden while the disciples sleep

Jesus on trial before Pilate / Peter denying Jesus

A couple of weeks ago I also ordered the "Resurrection Eggs" set from Christian Book Distributors (they had it on sale for Easter).  It is an advent calendar of sorts, except you open up an egg every day that has a piece of the Easter story inside.  I printed off a free printable set from one of the blogs I follow that corresponds to each egg--that way they have another visual to see and read with each egg.  The kids love opening these up and playing with the pieces inside!  (we just have to make sure this gets put up above their reach when we're done so Brilee doesn't get ahold of it!)

Moving on!  (I told you there was a lot to catch up on!) We blew out eggs and dyed them today so we can hang them on our tree outside....um, correction- I blew out the eggs (because it was SO difficult) and I dyed the eggs while the kids watched (because it was messy and I imagined in my head what would happen if one of the kids tipped the bowl of dye all over the counter/floor/themselves.  Thankfully, they still enjoyed watching and "helping" by stirring the eggs around in the bowl of dye.

Now they are ready to hang on our tree outside...which reminded me of the picture from Easter last year we took in front of our house.  Nana had made eggs with Sean last year and we hung them outside and took pics on Easter morning.  I am amazed how much the kids have grown in just 1 year!  Lilly seems like just a baby (she was 16 months here)


And I was about 5 months pregnant at the time--that seems like it was years ago now that Brilee is almost 10 months old and is crawling around and almost cruising!

Here's a little video of Brilee--not sure if it ever posted correctly on my previous blog post--



We have been extremely busy this week meeting friends at the park, going to lunch, working in the garden (that is a separate blog post in and of itself that I need to get up with pics!)  Our week of excitement continues tomorrow with an Easter Egg Hunt/party with some friends at church.  The kids are so excited!  We also have another hunt with some friends in the neighborhood on Saturday.   What fun!

Hot Cross Buns

The kids and I made hot cross buns today since we're studying X and I wanted something fun and not very structured for them to do.  It also came at the perfect time to start studying Easter since it is a traditional Easter recipe.   The kids had fun with these!



I forgot to take pictures while we were mixing the ingredients, but here they are rolling them out after the dough had risen an hour.



Sean with his pile of buns...he was saying, "look how many buns I have!"



Then they had to rise another 45 minutes until we brushed them with an egg wash and baked them.  Yummy!

The kids wanted to have their snack outside...it has been a BEAUTIFUL day today!  The kids have stayed outside almost all day except for our baking, and they are still there now while my chicken is marinating and I'm blogging :)

After this one bite, LIlly stopped eating the bun and merely licked off the X icing instead...

We're definitely going to make these again for Easter morning!

!

W-week

We have been studying the letter W this week.  Our Bible story this week comes from Mark 2:1-13 where Jesus heals the paralytic man so he can WALK.  We had fun walking around the school room in different ways:  slow, fast, big steps, little steps, tippy toes, etc.  I made up a little song while we were walking around the room--I've always loved just making up random words to songs when I couldn't remember the real words, and I guess this comes in handy now!

We then painted our Ws with watercolors.  The kids especially enjoyed this activity...I think watercolors are less messy when they use their fingers instead of brushes...not sure why, but they tend not to "mix" the colors into each other as badly this way!





Our board where we brainstormed "w" words...sean wanted to put YMCA up there, and I tried to explain why we couldn't...but it's difficult explaining the complexities of the English language!  He also keeps wanting to call this a double-v instead of double-u...he has a good point, don't you think? 

um, that was supposed to be Jesus walking on the water, BTW!

We then took a "W-hunt" around the house looking for things that start with the letter W.  We found wipes, wheel-loader, watering can, water bottles, Woody, whistle, whale, wrench, washcloth, wheel, watch, and wood....I must admit I helped them out quite a bit on this task, but they still loved it!



A picture with their hunting tub...Lilly cracks me up insisting on wearing her head band around her forehead.  

After story time at the library, we came home to have a picnic lunch.  It was quite Windy (had to plug that in there!) but the weather is beautiful this week!  

Brilee with the wind-swept hair look and green bean mouth.  (Yes, I moved her highchair outside to enjoy the weather so I didn't have to keep Indy, our dog, away as she does when I try feeding Brilee while on my lap!)  Can you believe she will be 9 months old tomorrow and still has NO TEETH???  This is a new one for me as Sean had teeth at 5 1/2 mo and Lilly at 6....I'm really ready for this little girl to be able to eat more finger foods than puffs, cheerios, and things that are soft enough to melt right away...let's get those teeth in soon, baby! 

So glad Sean & Lilly are over whatever stomach bug they had this weekend and we are finally back into a normal routine.  Sean starts flag football at the YMCA this Saturday, and I'm really looking forward to watching him run around on the field!

St. Patrick's Day Fun

I added more pictures from my phone after lunch and they showed up at the beginning of this post...not going to take the time to move them to the end...here are our  shamrock cookies and green lemonade!



We've been having a fun day so far doing St. Patrick's Day activities.  We started off the morning with green waffles (they were a pale green, and Sean was expecting bright green, but he got over the disappointment quickly!) Here's Brilee enjoying her green waffles...

Lilly did not want her picture taken.  Sean ate his so quickly, I couldn't get a picture of him!

They have been playing this Shamrock pattern matching game all this week.  I have found my new favorite is making folder games---they are easy to organize and the kids love them just as much as the board games they got for Christmas!  Sean's favorite shamrock is the polka-dot one, and he is learning a lesson in being happy for Lilly when she gets that one instead of him.



I remembered this idea from when I was in elementary school--potato stamps!  I cut the shape of a shamrock into the potato, and you have an instant stamp!  The kids enjoyed these and we reinforced the concept that the three leaves represent the trinity.





Showing off his stamp



I took these pictures a couple of days ago when we first made our green treasure hunting sensory tub.  I dyed rice green, added split peas and hid pennies inside.  The kids could play with this for hours except for the fact that I cringe when I see rice and peas accidentally fly out of the tub with their "penny pinchers"....it has been limited to 15 min at a time so that all the rice and peas last for longer than this year!



The kids are watching the Veggietales video right now about the history of St. Patrick's Day, then we're going to have green jello, and shamrock shaped sandwiches and shamrock cookies...I think I'll try to enjoy this stage of homeschooling when everything is fun and art/activity based...it takes much less preparation and thinking on my part!

Happy St. Patrick's Day, everyone!

p.s.--a quick history on our last name, Youngblood.  Jon's family has a whole book tracing their ancestors back to a Scotch-Irish decent with the last name Jonbloedt (had to go look up the spelling quickly there!)  so I feel somewhat of a desire to  have that heritage known to our kids even if this holiday can be skewed away from the spread of the gospel to Ireland!
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